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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. What important lesson does one student learn during her freshman year?

2. Why can't a student go to a movie with her best friend?

3. What is so special about the buses students rode in with Zlata and Mirna?

4. According to Zlata, what is important about what happens to people?

5. What does one student compare in his/her life to the Peanut Game?

Short Essay Questions

1. Why is Gruwell frustrated at the beginning of the semester in the spring of 1995?

2. Why did Zlata begin writing a diary and how did her diary evolve?

3. Why is Gruwell stereotyped by some of the other teachers?

4. Why does one student feel like Cinderella after a dinner at the Century City Marriott?

5. What happens to a Croatian boy named Tony?

6. Who is Gerda Seifer?

7. What do the students do when they play the peanut game?

8. Why is Zlata Filipovic pleased and honored to write a foreword for "The Freedom Writers Diary"?

9. Why is the word 'murder' a shadow hovering over a student's life the fall of 1995?

10. Why does a student decide 'odd' is not a three-letter word, but a seven-letter word?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

The students study Ralph Waldo Emerson when learning about self-reliance. What does this quote by Emerson mean: "Who so should be a man, must be a nonconformist"? How does the quote relate to self-reliance? From their diary entries, list examples of how the students are becoming more self-reliant. How is Gruwell helping the students become more self-reliant? How are the circumstances in their daily lives making the students more self-reliant?

Essay Topic 2

Violence is an everyday occurrence for the Freedom Writers in their homes and neighborhoods. Write about the violence they see everyday. How does this violence affect the students? How does this violence affect their families or friends? How does writing the diaries help the students learn to deal with the violence in their lives? Does Gruwell help the students to break this cycle of violence?

Essay Topic 3

In Diary 119, a student asks journalist Peter Maass how he can "simply sit and watch people die." Write about Mr. Maass's answer. Do you agree with his answer? Why or why not?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 944 words (approx. 4 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample